


Not Willing to Wait for it

by sunkelles



Category: Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst, Episode: s02e16 Rapunzel: Day One, F/F, POV Second Person, Rapunzel/Eugene - Freeform, Season 3, moon opal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-29
Updated: 2019-12-29
Packaged: 2021-02-27 09:02:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22024525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunkelles/pseuds/sunkelles
Summary: When she's left without memories, Rapunzel kisses Cass. That doesn't stop the betrayal, but it does make it a different kind of painful.
Relationships: Cassandra/Rapunzel (Disney: Tangled)
Comments: 12
Kudos: 161





	Not Willing to Wait for it

**Author's Note:**

> hey so, i literally have not seen anything past season 3 episode 1. if we get information that contradicts this characterization later on in the show, i haven't seen it yet! i hope that it's alright i just had a lot of Feelings and wanted to get them out when i had writing time
> 
> title, of course, comes from "wait for it" from hamilton, because literally all i could think about with cass's betrayal was aaron burr finally getting tired of waiting, blowing up, shooting hamilton dead, and having to deal with the fallout! enjoy the angst!

With the light of the moon and the light of the fire, your small camp is well-lit enough that you can see everything that you need to. You can see Rapunzel’s lips quirk in a smile as you drop her flower into the soup, dyeing the whole thing bright blue. You ladle her out a bowl and then hand it over. You clasp your green vial of completed potion and consider slipping it into her soup.

You decide to wait a moment, though. You want to get to know tower era Rapunzel a little better. You feel like it might help you understand the one that you’re clashing with.

“So,” you say, getting a bowl for yourself, “is the world outside your tower as bad as you thought?" 

“I don’t know,” Rapunzel says, twirling the spoon in her liquid, “there were some scary things today, but I also got to meet you.” You feel yourself smile a little.

“Was I one of those scary things?” you tease. She giggles and shakes her head.

“Of course not,” she says.

“Care to elaborate?” you ask, because maybe you’re having a good time teasing her before she gets her memories back. Rapunzel shakes her head, and then shoves a spoonful of soup in her mouth so you can’t expect her to respond. You know her tricks, but you shake your head anyway. It’s so much easier to be with her like this.

This Rapunzel doesn’t remember to be condescending. She doesn’t remember that she doesn’t trust you. 

“Maybe mother was wrong,” Rapunzel says, “it seems like some people might be… nice.” She moves closer to you on the log, and then sits so closely that you’re touching.

“I hope that we’re not all terrible,” you say, turning to her send her a _look_. She’s just grinning, though, grinning and bouncing and suddenly the distance between your two faces is shrinking-

She kisses you on the lips, and you feel like an asteroid has hit the earth. A very brief asteroid, as the peck is over in a moment. You bring your hand gently to your lips, ghosting over the spot where here lips were only a moment ago.

“Why did you do that?” you whisper.

“I don’t know,” Rapunzel says, and her cheeks are bright red, “I just wanted to.” She smiles a little.

“Did you like it?” she asks. You find yourself nodding, because you can’t even _fathom_ talking right now. There’s no words- just a jumbled mess of feelings that you can’t sort through. Joy and disappointment and bittersweet longing.

A piece of world-shaking, gut-wrenching knowledge settles on your shoulders: maybe if you’d gotten to her first, Rapunzel would have fallen in love with you instead.

“Yeah,” you manage to say, terror creeping through your veins, “I did.” There’s a part of you that wants to just throw this potion away and forget that it even existed. Forget that you ever had the history where you’d spent years pining after Rapunzel and your feelings started to sour- pretend that you found her first and she started to fall in love with you.

You could run off together, start fresh. Maybe her flaws wouldn’t jar you as much if you weren’t aching over the fact that you can’t have her.

But you know that you couldn’t do that. It wouldn’t really be winning, and there’s no way that Eugene or Lance or the King and Queen wouldn’t track you two down eventually. Then she’d know what you’d done, and everyone else would too. And no one would ever forgive you. It wouldn’t be worth the guilt and the risk to eek out a few months of unearned bliss.

Rapunzel grins, her little eyes crinkling.

“Do you wanna do it again?” she asks. You reach down, grabbing at the vial as quickly as you can. You take her hand and gently slip the vial in it.

“Drink this. It’ll make the next kiss feel even better,” you promise as you swallow down your greed and you swallow down your pride. Then, Rapunzel swallows down the potion too. It takes a moment for the potion to take effect, but you can see the confusion in her eyes the moment that it does.

“Cass,” she says, “how did we get here?” You aren’t sure whether or not you’re relieved that she doesn’t remember the journey, but you tell her about the spell and the antidote anyways. You leave out the kiss. You don’t really want to talk about that right now. Maybe you won't ever want to talk about that at all. 

“Thank you for keeping me safe even though you’re angry with me,” Rapunzel says.

“I’m glad that you’re back, Raps,” Cass says. Rapunzel wraps her arms around you, and it’s warm, encompassing. But there’s no kiss. No hint of what had been spoken before she regained her memories. Rapunzel gets you to rant to her, admit the reasons why you’re angry, but it doesn’t make the anger dissipate. By the time that you get back to camp and see her nearly jump into Eugene’s arms before planting a kiss on his lips, you feel that anger all over again.

_That could have been me,_ you think, _that **should** have been me. _

No matter what, Eugene will always come first. And you won't get the glory or the girl, waiting for a happy ending that won't ever come. Because that’s fair, right? At least, it’s as fair as you were ever going to get.

You keep traveling, then you get stuck in the messed up confusion that is The House of Yesterday’s Tomorrows. You don’t find anything but wacky antics until you’re separated from the group.

You find yourself in a meadow, an achingly familiar meadow with a cottage that you could swear that you knew. There’s a little blue girl and suddenly, you’re reliving memories that you’ve suppressed for your whole life. Being abandoned by your mother doesn’t hurt any less when you realize that she’s Rapunzel’s Mother Gothel. It might just hurt worse.

You know on an intellectual level that Gothel’s “love” is not something to covet. It’s certainly not something to fight over, but still- _still._ You have felt nothing but the sting of rejection all of your life, and seeing yourself tiny and vulnerable, desperate to please and desperate to be _loved._ left to die by your own mother so that she could have her true prize: it feels like having someone reach into your heart and rip at your organs.

Every strange, confusing look your father ever sent you makes sense now. He knew that you had bad blood from the start. He found you, a tiny, crying child of a villain instead of the princess. You had nothing but the pain of abandonment seeping through your bloodstream, and you know that he was disappointed. To be given a tiny, weeping child of a villain instead of the golden princess they were hunting must have been devastating.

Did he even want you, or did he feel obligated to raise the villain-spawn so that she wouldn’t turn against the crown? So that you wouldn’t fulfill your own destiny?

You feel the rage boiling within you, and you look down at your hands. You see the little blue spirit try to take your hand in comfort. She looks up at you with understanding eyes.

“I am sorry about all of this,” she says, “everything that you’ve gone through has been so painful.” You watch this tiny version of yourself sob into your father’s arms, and the pain in your heart feels like Rapunzel’s decay charm. Whatever love had been there is decaying into nothingness, anger and jealousy and desire for more seeping into every last crevice. You've always been second choice, from your father to your mother and to Rapunzel herself. If you had gotten there a little sooner, if you had fought harder- none of it even matters. Your mother would always choose Rapunzel. After meeting Eugene, Rapunzel might have decided that she loved him better, even if you got there first. Maybe you were always going to end up as a second choice. 

But you won't be anymore. 

“You can make it all better,” the spirit says.

“I won’t keep waiting,” you swear, “I will reach out and take what I’m owed.” You won’t be second best any longer. The spirit smiles, sharp as a knife.

“I can show you exactly how to get what you’re owed.”

It’s strange, to live life as normal, plotting against Rapunzel. You know that this is the only way to move forward, but it feels dirty. You wish that they could just get to the dark kingdom already so that you can get this over with.

When you finally get to the dark kingdom, you make your way through the castle towards the stone. Your guilt lights up on the way, doubts racing in your mind. By the time that you, Rapunzel, and Eugene enter the cavern that houses the moon stone, you’ve almost convinced yourself that you won’t grab it after all.

But then, Rapunzel takes your hands, and she “thanks” you for “everything”. No specifics, no sincerity, just empty words meant to placate you going forward. It’s just so fucking condescending that you remember exactly why you were already planning this. Rapunzel has never actually loved you the way that she claimed. There’s a hug, and you feel yourself shying away from it.

“Okay Rapunzel,” you say, trying not to sound as impatient as you feel, “it’s time.” Rapunzel takes Eugene’s hand, and he flashes her that sickeningly supportive smile. You try not to feel ill, thinking about how often that look has graced your own face.

“Go get your destiny,” he tells her, and you restrain yourself from rolling your eyes. Rapunzel has had _nothing_ but destiny. It’s time for someone else to have her turn. Rapunzel walks towards the Moonstone’s onyx cage, and it opens like a blossoming flower for her. The moonstone glows bright blue and floats softly up towards her hand.

But you’ve always been faster than her, more agile. You’re able to run forward and snatch it away before she even notices you’ve moved. You clutch the stone in your hands, bright light shining through your glove.

“Cassandra, what are you doing?” Rapunzel demands, horror in her eyes.

“I’m fulfilling _my_ destiny,” you say, and you clutch the stone even harder as it tries to hop out of your hand. A burst of blue energy shoots out of it, shoving both Rapunzel and Eugene back. Lighting spurts around it, lighting the chasm in blue. Rapunzel’s hair flows in the wind storm it’s created. You clutch it tighter as the energy seers through you, and you tug it down against the pull, shoving the stone into your chest.

It levitates you off the ground, the lighting spewing forth now from your own chest.

The stone burns as your body assimilates it, and you feel pain as spikes grow from your limbs. The pain, however, is brief. The spikes flatten to make a protective shell around your limbs- your armor now a part of your body as much as it is a part of your soul. Then, the stone stops levitating.

You feel no more pain, then, only _power._ You laugh.

“I tried to warn you, Rapunzel,” you say, glaring down at her as you create spikes between you, “you have to be careful who you trust.” Rapunzel’s eyes are watering when she looks up at you.

“Why would you do this?” she asks. You want to turn tail and run, start making your own memories and your own life immediately. You’ve never been one for feelings, why would you grace Rapunzel with an explanation? But, that was part of what killed your relationship, right? You might as well give it a proper eulogy. 

“Evil runs in the family, I suppose,” you drawl.

“But your dad is captain of the guard,” Rapunzel says, "there's nothing evil about him." 

“My biological family, Rapunzel,” you say, “in the House of Yesterday’s Tomorrow, I figured out where I came from.” Rapunzel's confusion only grows, and you decide to put her out of her misery. 

“I saw my own mother leave me to die for a baby with glowing blonde hair,” you spit. Rapunzel’s eyes widen.

“Cass, if what you’re saying is true.. it means-“

“It means that I’m Gothel’s daughter, and your destiny belongs to me,” you hiss.

“Cass, we’re friends,” she says. You see the moment the idea dawns on her, and it turns your stomach.

“In fact, if you’re Gothel’s daughter, that… that makes us _closer_ than friends. It makes us sisters.” You laugh, the sound catching in your throat. It shouldn’t hurt, hearing that. You should be over it, hardened just like the rocks you can form now, but you’re not. You still remember the feel of her lips on yours. 

“That’s the only “closer than friends” you can see me being, isn’t it?” you ask.

“What does that mean?” Rapunzel asks, eyebrows furrowing in confusion, “what else is closer than friends?” And you just start _laughing._ She’s so focused on Eugene now that she couldn’t even _fathom_ loving you. The sickness in your stomach returns, but you just keep laughing.

“What is so funny?” she demands, and the confusion on her face only grows. Eugene sends her a soft look and puts a hand on her shoulder.

“You really don’t know, do you?” he asks. Rapunzel’s wide-eyed confusion is enough of an answer for them both

“She’s in love with you,” Eugene says, voice barely above a whisper. You laugh, again, the discordant pitches echoing through the cave.

“I _was_ ,” you say, “but that was in the past.” Rapunzel looks at you like you’ve shattered her heart, but she pushes herself to her feet.

“Cass, please,” Rapunzel says, “I love you. Just- let us fix this. Whatever it is.” She takes a step forward, and you throw your arm out, sending a bright blue stalagmite shooting out of the ground.

“No,” you say, shaking your head, “I won’t go back to being second best just because I didn’t get there first.” You clench your hands into fists and throw them down beside you, a whole slew of stalagmites erupting from the floor like geysers. Rapunzel runs forward then, and she tries to squeeze herself between two of the rocks. You send up another spike then to block her path through the two stones. 

“That’s not gonna work, Raps,” you tell her. You hear a thump then as Rapunzel punches at the spike. She lets out a cry of pain, and you almost scold her for being so reckless. But you're not her protector anymore, so you don't bother. 

“Just wait a second!" she begs, "Please, talk to me." _Wait._ Whatever residue of doubt you might have had fades away.

_Wait, wait, **waIT**_

“It’s too late, Raps,” you sneer, “I’m done waiting for you.” You curl your hands again, sending another round of spikes her way. Then, you escape. No more waiting. You will write your own story, find your own glory.

It’s not like you were ever going to get the girl in the end. You showed up far too late to get _that_ happy ending.


End file.
